The use of video telephony, which allows remote parties to both see and hear one another, is becoming increasingly popular. As used herein, “video telephony” refers to visual communication using both video and audio transmitted over a communications network. It includes both mobile and stationary video telephony. Typically, video telephony refers to packet-switched and circuit-switched, wireless and wired, audio and video communications, such as Voice Over IP or VoIP communications, and video teleconferencing. Such applications facilitate remote communication by providing a visual image of each conference participant. Accordingly, video conferencing allows parties to communicate audibly and visibly, without requiring lengthy and expensive travel.
In a typical video telecommunications application, a camera is positioned to obtain an image of each of the participants. The image of one participant is then provided to the other participant so that each participant is viewing the other participant during the communication session. The video telecommunications interaction can include two or more participants, each viewing an image of the other participant(s).
When conducting a video conference or point-to-point video call, a participant may desire to monitor the video displayed to the other participants for privacy and other reasons. For example, the participant may not want to participate in a video call or have video enabled if his or her appearance is not acceptable to himself and/or the other party. In a business setting, a participant may not want the other party to see that his attire is business casual (i.e. without a tie). A participant may not want the other party to see his or her facial appearance when it is not presentable. A participant may not want to participate in a video call when the video quality will be poor.
There are a variety of features in current video telecommunications applications for addressing some, but not all, of these issues. For example, a sending participant may mute the transmission of his or her image information so that the other party's video monitor is a blank screen. The other party will receive an indication that the sending participant has muted his or her image information. While muting does provide a degree of privacy, it can be easy for a party to forget to mute the video in any of the situations set forth above, particularly given the unexpected and unpredictable nature of telephone calls. As set forth in copending U.S. application Ser. No. 10/941,199, filed Sep. 14, 2004, entitled “CUSTOMIZABLE BACKGROUND FOR VIDEO COMMUNICATIONS”, a party can alter his or her background before the video stream is transmitted to the other party. However, the participant may only want to alter his or her background for specific callers/callees and not for everyone or alter his or her background in different ways for different callers/callees.